Granule Etching

Recycling silicon results in permanent cost reductions through use of nearly 100% of the produced Si material

When processing polycrystalline silicon or during wafer production, it is almost impossible to avoid breakage. DECKER’s innovative recycling unit ensures not a single gram of precious silicon is lost! 

The granule etching unit chops down “old wafers” or wafer breakage down to a maximum size of 5 mm and cleans the surface using an acid etching process. The process is carried out using a throughfeed operation with unique vacuum technology. The minimum annual capacity of the unit is 60 kg/h x 6,600 h = 386 t p.a.

System characteristics: 

• Fully automatic chopping, etching, drying, portioning and bagging 
• Systematic extraction of harmful gases with subsequent purification 
• Bagging under clean room conditions 
• Recycling of up to 1,000 tons of granule per year 
• Extremely low consumption of chemicals and rinse water 
• Important process parameters are continually monitored 

Advantages: 

• Have a cost-reducing effect in the long term 
• Particularly resource-saving 
• Reliable system design 
• Re-creates superlative high-quality silicon 
• Innovative drying concept 
• Individually adapted 
• Turnkey solution possible